Buried
by Cantare
Summary: In these woods, she imagined there were shadows that even he could not control.


The emblem of the village was strewn around them in countless shades and shapes, shifting in the breeze, falling with the reluctance of slow sunsets. It was late autumn. Most of the leaves were brown, the faded hue of life past its prime.

The man walking beside her often told her she was beautiful. Or rather, he stated it, just like any other fact, one of the millions of data files cleanly arranged in the vast stores of his mind. She had never received a compliment from him, only impartial truths. He couldn't be bothered with more, though he knew of her insecurity. Neither of them could be considered old by any means, but they weren't getting any younger. And as a woman, she felt the passing of years more acutely than he.

In these woods, it seemed her doubt was as audible as the quiet, dark laughter of the breeze filtering through the trees, like the dry scratch of cracked nails on wood. She imagined there were shadows here that even he could not control. But with the practiced control of a genjutsu expert, she drew a veil over those uncertainties and thought of certainties instead.

For all she had dreamed and fantasized about marriage in her adolescent years, she had never thought it would make her feel this old. But today she felt old, dull, past her bloom. He would tell her it was just her hormones speaking. Pregnancy had turned out to be quite a mixed bag for her. To him, it was merely "troublesome," as was everything else.

She had never imagined marrying a man like him. They would have remained teammates, comrades, friends, confidants…but husband and wife? He was none of the things she had imagined her husband to be—stunningly handsome, bold, charismatic, endearing. He didn't go out of his way to make her feel loved or special to him, and his offhand statements about her beauty felt like clinical assessments at most.

And he had probably never imagined he would marry a woman like her, except maybe for the "troublesome" part. She was loud, petty, too social for his liking, too painstakingly feminine in her every mannerism and movement. She was clearly beneath his league in terms of intellect, a fact that sometimes still unsettled her, though she knew he didn't care, just as she didn't care that he wasn't handsome or charming.

Maybe it was because over the years they had stopped caring about their differences and just accepted that they were together. They could have remained teammates, comrades, friends, confidants…but for the fact that they loved each other more than any of those relationships entailed.

Love came quietly, as the slow turn of color from verdant green to light gold, crisp orange, and ripened crimson in the leaves during autumn. She thought of this each fall they had shared together so far, each time they walked through this forest. To him it was an unremarkable stroll through grounds he had been familiar with since childhood. To her it was an unsettling test of her own imagination, because of the shadows that lived here.

She had learned to appreciate these rare aimless days, as with age and experience came doubts and regrets that unfurled like scrolls in her mind every day, unread by others save for him. She no longer tended and sold flowers, but extracted, spliced, and cloned their cells to create deadlier and faster weapons for Konoha, poisons that could kill within seconds, that selectively numbed the senses, that loosened the tongue for interrogation, that could painlessly purge the womb of life within the first week of conception.

Her hand unconsciously went to her stomach. They walked silently on. A minute later her other hand was held loosely in his. He had read her again. Perhaps he could see the shadows cast by her mind.

This would be the first life she would bring into the world instead of out of it. She had killed many, or rather she had assisted in killing many. Always indirectly, first through her mind manipulation jutsus, and now through her poisons.

Shikamaru as well. He was an ANBU strategist now, which might explain how little they talked to each other as of late. He probably had more secrets filed away in the labyrinth of his mind than anyone else of his rank in the village. The most important of them were sealed even from his own knowledge, only unlocked for his perusal when necessary. He was made to stand in the shadows, behind the bloodshed, arranging deaths with intricately drawn maps and detailed assassination plans. He opened paths for others to kill. The only direct kill he had ever made was

—near this fork in the leaf-strewn path, down the trail on the left.

The clouds floated onward over their heads, oblivious to the silent crawl of tension between them, the way they both averted their glances from that side of the fork. She shivered as a ravaged clearing hung like a rusted photograph in her mind's eye.

His hand tightened around hers. They walked on.

"You have flowers picked out for tomorrow?" In his voice she heard calm indifference and the hint of a mask.

"Yeah."

"Kurenai will meet us for lunch."

"Okay."

Unspoken—the image of the path, lingering with dread, imprinted itself in her mind. The whispers were formless and indirect. Like listening to a message meant for someone else through a muffled panel.

Maybe the message was meant for the man who walked beside her.

The question voiced itself from her lips. "Do you ever wonder…if that place…if it…"

"That path is sealed, Ino," he said quietly.

Sealed. The way that an envelope was sealed, still carrying a letter written in blood, each word pulsing with life as a beating heart, waiting to be read and answered.

Or the way fate was sealed, dictating that she would never shake this feeling of unease from her senses and memory.

She wished she could be as logical as he. To see the world in its infinite shades and remain at a distance, impassive, to inquire only about what was necessary, and to dismiss the rest as irrelevant. But that was not who she was. She could not bury her fears, which stemmed from the knowledge that Shikamaru's only direct kill was a lie, that even a genius could not kill an immortal. He had just added another living shadow to these woods, one that he could not control. It was buried, immersed in darkness and crushed under heavily compacted earth, chained and barricaded by half a dozen seals.

But it was still there.

And it always would be.

He gave her his jacket wordlessly. She accepted it, but as she draped it around her thin shoulders, they both knew it was not the cold that caused her to shiver.

They had less time these days to take walks through here. It was usually her idea to come; after all these years, it was still a test. She was learned in the arts of genjutsu, yet could not master the shadows of reality that lived here. Irrational. Superstitious. Typical of a woman, Shikamaru would say.

She could at least try to hide or forget her unease, even if it would not die. Burying things was sometimes the best one could do.


End file.
